Making a robot can be an incredibly rewarding experience. It’s the perfect combination of creativity, engineering and problem solving. However, if you’re just getting started in robotics, it can also be overwhelming. To make things easier for those who are just starting out, we’ve put together some tips and tricks to help makers bring robots to life! From the basics of assembling your robot to software implementation, these pointers will give you everything you need to get started on your robotic adventure!
G4’s Attack of the Show had the folks from the aiBAR on – they will be in our new Makers book we’re about to announce soon – “Nate Strech, Joel Wollborg, and Torrey Baumstark have an unhealthy obsession with drinking that has resulted in the creation of the aiBAR, an automated robotic bartender. It’s not yet available commercially, but we think their idea has definite profit potential.” [via] Link.
Gene is looking for a scriptable USB-IR controller – “So far I have not been able to find such an animal. I bought the first generation of Robosapian. The robot from wowwe toys. It comes with a real crazy remote control. You have to press many keys in certain combinations to make the robot do anything. If I could program a dynamic IR device with the codes and then create scripts.. It would be possible for me to make my robot do all kinds of neat things. Also I am into doing time lapse videos. That is where you setup a camera and let it run for about an hour.. I throw the video into my computer and use the editing software to speed things up. That is fine.. But I have an Olympus 8mp digital SLR camera. It also has an IR control out. A programmable IR device as I described above would really help me out with my camera. I could setup a high resolution picture every 15 seconds using a laptop on location replacing the IR controller. This would produce a very high quality time lapse once I put it in my editing software.” I think the USB-UIRT might be a good start, any other suggestions for Gene? Link.
Mocapitator let us know that the new Beck video we mentioned, starring the Sony QRIO robots is now live on the Beck site. I just watched it and I think the QRIOs are a lot more interesting than their role in the video. I worked on a few Sony projects in the past in Japan and China, some with the QRIOs and they’re creepy-cool. If you’ve seen the QRIOs in action, then this video might not seem that interesting, it’s pretty much their dance routine when they’re out in public – but still fun to watch. Link.
“There’s a reason Beck has been so hush-hush about the video for his new single, “Hell Yes.” Actually, there are four reasons. They’re called QRIOs, so-called “dream robots” developed by Sony Japan as high-tech playthings for children. QRIO can carry on conversations, adapt to a multitude of environments and — most importantly — mimic human movements, including complex dance routines. Currently, there are only four working QRIOs in the world. And all of them appear in the “Hell Yes” video.” [via] Link.
Here’s part two of Jason’s HOW TO make a robot car – “This is the second part in a howto series about building a relatively cheap robot out of a radio controlled car and an embedded microcontroller such as the Basic Stamp.” Link.
Today is iRobot’s first day of trading on the NASDAQ stock market under the symbol “IRBT.” iRobot’s PackBot Tactical Mobile Robot will be the first robot in history to ring the NASDAQ stock market opening bell (iRobot makes the Roomba as well as the PackBot Tactical Mobile Robots). Link.
Greg from